Google Ranking Issue

[link.master]

Hi,
I'm working over a site which has two version one is .com and another is .nl version. I'm doing link building work for .com version of site. When I started link building work site is on 1 page for many keywords but as we go on building links rankings are dramatically got down in google.nl.

Is there any issue of duplicate content since both version display same content?
Presently site shows 224 backlinks on google.nl

link:www.delicasa.com - Google Search (http://www.google.nl/search?sourceid=navclient&aq=t&hl=en-GB&ie=UTF-8&rlz=1T4GGIC_en-GBIN229IN229&q=link%3awww%2edelicasa%2ecom)

Looking forward for your reply..Thanks

[Toni Anicic]

when you started building links your site ranked well in most of the keywords because it was a new site. It's a well known fact that google ranks new site well and after a short period of time the site drops in rankings were it should be.

[ctabuk]

Yes, but conversly -if you add more content and link in and out then it is quite possible to reachieve the SERP - but do it slowly.

[sheena]

There is no issue of duplicate content because is it with different URL and domain name. It is usual for the keywords to goes down. Just continue with the link building and some technique on how to rank keywords.

Hi,
I'm working over a site which has two version one is .com and another is .nl version. I'm doing link building work for .com version of site. When I started link building work site is on 1 page for many keywords but as we go on building links rankings are dramatically got down in google.nl.

Is there any issue of duplicate content since both version display same content?
Presently site shows 224 backlinks on google.nl

link:www.delicasa.com - Google Search (http://www.google.nl/search?sourceid=navclient&aq=t&hl=en-GB&ie=UTF-8&rlz=1T4GGIC_en-GBIN229IN229&q=link%3awww%2edelicasa%2ecom)

Looking forward for your reply..Thanks

[Ralph]

when you started building links your site ranked well in most of the keywords because it was a new site. It's a well known fact that google ranks new site well and after a short period of time the site drops in rankings were it should be.

Hi Toni,

Thanks for answering. I am working with the initial poster in this issue, so this is why I am interfering.

Actually the website Italiaanse wijnen, olijfolie uit Italie - Delicasa.com de beste wijndeals online! (http://www.delicasa.nl) was not new at all. It was already there in 2001. Italiaanse wijnen, olijfolie uit Italie - Delicasa.com de beste wijndeals online! (http://Www.delicasa.com) was connected to this website since October last year.

Would it help to make a redirect from Italiaanse wijnen, olijfolie uit Italie - Delicasa.com de beste wijndeals online! (http://www.delicasa.com) to Italiaanse wijnen, olijfolie uit Italie - Delicasa.com de beste wijndeals online! (http://www.delicasa.nl) instead of having both URL's pointing to this website?

As you can see, all HTML pages have the Italiaanse wijnen, olijfolie uit Italie - Delicasa.com de beste wijndeals online! (http://www.delicasa.nl) URL prefix.

your help is much appreciated.

best, Ralph

[Ralph]

Yes, but conversly -if you add more content and link in and out then it is quite possible to reachieve the SERP - but do it slowly.

what is slowly? How many inbound links per month?

[Zombie Master]

I've found the number of new links is not as critical as the type of link. Read over Google's comments on link farms and be very careful not to look like one. Keep it on topic and you should be fine.

Also, what ctabuk said is critical. Content content content and make it fresh. Google likes well-written text and can sniff out redundant copy.

Everyone else has good advice also. Don't be too alarmed over SERP's dropping after an inital good showing, especially if it is a new site. The sandbox bugaboo seems to still be alive and well.

[GizGaz]

Hi link.master!

I'm rather new to the world of being a web-master, hence I've been doing an awful lot of reading... here is one article I think you'll find informative:

SearchEngineWatch (http://searchenginewatch.com/showPage.html?page=2160301)

I hope this helps you out with your link building strategy.

Kind Regards,

GizGaz

[subsystems]

You seem to have problems with your sites. The “flag” links in the upper right would seem to imply different regional sites or languages.
One quickie, add an alt tag images and/or title tag to the links so when you hover the mouse over the flag it tells the visitor. eg; English, French, German etc. or United States, France, Germany etc.
Lastly, I found myself a bit confused when I clicked back and forth on the different flags and the language didn't change as expected. I was expecting the graphics and text on the entire site to switch between the different languages. Some pages switch sometimes but it is not consistent.
It would seem that the SEs and spiders are going to not understand the difference either. The URLs for different languages are exactly the same. eg; I went to the home page of the .nl site and clicked the 2nd wine bottle labeled Fobiano 2003 - La Carraia. I was taken to a page as expected showing an English description. Then I went to the 2nd flag in the upper right, hovered and looked at the url in the status bar, I then watched the URL in the address bar and clicked the flag. The URL did not change at all, but the language changed. Best case the spiders will only see the .nl and .com versions with duplicate content of the same language. Somebody please correct me if I am wrong but isn't that exactly the duplicate content problem we have all become so fond of?
Secondly, won't the regional SEs have a hard time with this since the URLs for the different languages are exactly the same? I was expecting to see different URLs for the different languages so each URL would rank differently in the different regional SEs. Currently IBLs from different regional sites will point to the same URL but not in the correct language. I'm pretty sure there are going to be some unexpected things happening with the SERPs of these pages. It may result in the pages position jumping around with no apparent reason.
Lastly, you may be missing out on the unique content of the different languages being at different URLs. Eg; us/product1.php English content and fr/product1.php with French content. (or whatever URL structure makes sense to you.) Even though they represent the same product, each is worded for the region and would be unique content. As it sits you are not gaining this advantage.
I personally have not written regional sites so someone else should chime-in with some guidance for you.

[pchauhan]

ya



In maximum cases the new site always ranks high in th SE but after some time it will get its actual position where it should bee.. so continew to work on this site surely it will rank :)

[davidweb]

Duplicate Content is a serious issues. You should try to convert your .nl website into dutch language or rather change the entire content.

[Ralph]

Hello Subsystems,

Would this help:

1) Create a permanent redirect from .nl to .com
2) Leave out French and German language flag, as they are not showing different languages
3) Make sure, when clicking the UK flag, the URL will be different form the URL when clicking the Dutch flag.

best, Ralph

[Clarrie]

Is there any issue of duplicate content since both version display same content?

If both pages are the same, yes there is. I've run across this issue several times (with .com and .co.uk usually, but the same principle applies). If you watch you'll see that probably what's going on is that Google identifies the pages that are duplicate and uses the most recent, dropping the older one (the most recently crawled takes precedence). This results in pages "switching" between the two domains on each subsequent recrawl.

This isn't always a problem, but if you are diligently building links to the .com and not the .nl , you will find that the pages jump up and down the rankings depending upon whether it's a .com or .nl page because of the differing page rank of the two domains.

The SEO solution I normally suggest to clients is to decide on which domain they wish to focus on, and concentrate on that and use a 301 redirect to divert the page rank of the secondary domain to the primary. Not all of them have chosen this option for reasons other than SEO, but those that have have found the ranking of the primary domain improve as well as getting rid of the oscillation up and down the rankings.

[villageloop]

Duplicate Content is a serious issues. You should try to convert your .nl website into dutch language or rather change the entire content.

I would go with converting the language.
That is probabaly easier than having to write new content.
Besides, the conversion will be like new content anyways, there is never a direct translation between languages.

[subsystems]

If it were me, I'd convert the English site .com to Dutch .nl so you have 2 seperate sites.
When you do your link building try to get Dutch sites to link to the Dutch domain and the English to the .com domain.
I agree with Villageloop. Because of the differences in language you shouldn't be in any danger of duplicate content.
I would think this would help ranking with Google Dutch Google (http://www.google.com/intl/nl/) etc.
I suppose when you do your Dutch link building you could obtain an English link as well. This should give you more IBLs for your .com domain. When you concider that most websites are English, many foreign visitors are going to have to use translate tools. So you should get the benefit from both links.

Yes drop the French and German flags if you are not going to use them. But if there is a market in those areas it might be to your advantage to develope sites for those Languages as well.

[Webnauts]

Yes, but conversly -if you add more content and link in and out then it is quite possible to reachieve the SERP - but do it slowly.
Side Note: Frequent updates to your pages may increase the search engine crawl rate, but it won't increase your rankings.

[incrediblehelp]

Would it help to make a redirect from Italiaanse wijnen, olijfolie uit Italie - Delicasa.com de beste wijndeals online! (http://www.delicasa.com) to Italiaanse wijnen, olijfolie uit Italie - Delicasa.com de beste wijndeals online! (http://www.delicasa.nl) instead of having both URL's pointing to this website?

Sure if the content is going to be the same on both. But if you want to target Americans and other countries then having the TLD in each country with unique content can really help you rank.

[Ralph]

We created a permanent redirect 301 from the .nl domain to delicasa.com

everything was renamed to .com also the URL's in the SiteMap.

The search results jumped to page 1 and than after a couple of days again back to....well somewhere on page 20 (I stopped looking). So, worse than ever.

I am lost here. :confused:

Can anyone shine a light in the dark?

best, Ralph

[erikko]

is it possible that your rank drops when your traffic drops

[carolin.c22]

I'm woring on website for three months & the ran still 0 :(

[uberanimal]

I'm woring on website for three months & the ran still 0 :(
thats actually common. just give it time and keep putting your link out there to good sources. don't spam either... that can hurt.

[incrediblehelp]

Ralph how can you positively say the redirect change lead to the drop?

[Webnauts]

We created a permanent redirect 301 from the .nl domain to delicasa.com

everything was renamed to .com also the URL's in the SiteMap.

The search results jumped to page 1 and than after a couple of days again back to....well somewhere on page 20 (I stopped looking). So, worse than ever.

I am lost here. :confused:

Can anyone shine a light in the dark?

best, Ralph
The info is not enough to be able to tell anything.

Where did you rankings drop? At Google.com or Google.nl?